Foreign Policy and Hostage Situations
by Curlscat
Summary: Sequel to AMaWoS: Everything seems settled after the end of the war with Magica, until the Grimms hear about a loose end they forgot to tie up: Red, lunatic extraordinaire, is loose with her monsters, and not in the Tradeskingdoms. The kids have to go retrieve her before she causes problems, but this may be hard in a land where they're unwanted intruders, not foreign royalty.
1. A Request Is Put Forth

**AN~ Here's the sequel, everybody! It's not going to be updated very often, maybe once a month to start with (that's all I'm promising), but it's out when I said it would be, and it's gonna be FUN.**

**Disclaimer: I own the world and the people who aren't transposed from the series. I also own this rendition of the concept. Other than that, though, I'm just borrowing some stuff.**

* * *

Things were good in Sabrina's life. She had her whole family back together, she'd dumped the responsibility of being queen (for a while, at least), she had friends, and she had her husband.

Of course, sometimes it was hard to appreciate that last one. Especially when he turned their entire bedroom suite into a miniature forest.

Still, she'd learned, in the year they'd been married, that giving him a reaction was just what he wanted. So instead she walked down the hall to her sister's room, knocked on the door, and waited for Daphne to answer the door.

"What is it?" Daphne asked when she finally made it to the door. In one hand, the girl held a pen, and in the other she held a wand. There was a large amount of ink spattered across her left cheek, and Sabrina was pretty sure that the ink was sparkling.

"Never mind," Sabrina said, backing away. "I wanted somewhere to sleep where I _wouldn't_ have to deal with magic transforming my bed, but it doesn't look like your room is what I want. Goodnight."

"No, come back!" Daphne said. "I'm almost done. I was just trying to clean up."

Sabrina raised an eyebrow. "You sure?" She poked a head around Daphne's door, noticing that there seemed to be ink covering more than her sister's face and clothes. Far more.

"Yeah," Daphne said. "I mean, no, but... we barely talk anymore. I miss you."

Sabrina gave her sister a small smile and stepped gingerly into the room, narrowly avoiding stepping into a particularly large puddle of ink. It _had_ been a while since they'd really spent much time together. She'd been meaning to fix that, but there was Puck, and there were all kinds of things that needed taking care of to make sure her parents were actually the king and queen of Sneak again (the transition had been a difficult one, because Sneak law was not set up for a queen abdicating because her predecessors had returned), and she actually had time to have _friends_ again, and they were both still in school, and Daphne had her own things to take care of, and somehow they didn't seem to see much of each other unless someone else was around. She could deal with magical ink to make up for that.

"What were you trying to _do_?" Sabrina asked.

"I wanted to turn it invisible," Daphne muttered, poking a sparkly ink puddle with her shoe and glaring at it. "Instead it started to sparkle. And then I tried to turn it back to normal and it exploded."

"Why invisible?" Sabrina asked, pulling off her sash (it was old and worn anyway, and she could always get a new one) and using it to mop up a puddle.

Daphne blushed and muttered something under her breath that sounded like "Pinocchio."

Sabrina used her best Diplomat Face to smother her smile. Daphne and Pinocchio's relationship had gone through some rocky points, but they seemed to be pretty good friends now, keeping in touch through letters because he was deeply buried in research in Scholar and Daphne, at fifteen, had been ordered by her parents to stay in Sneak until she was legally independent, if not finished with school.

"Shut up," Daphne snapped.

"I didn't say anything," Sabrina pointed out, doing her best to keep her voice completely innocent.

"You didn't have to," Daphne said.

Sabrina gave her sister's parlor a thoughtful look to cover for her amusement. She knew how frustrating it was to be matchmade. The room was veritably_bathed_ in glittering ink. It was all over the sofa, the chairs, the rug, the desk, the table, the walls and the portraits on them. Even the fire (it had been a cold spring, and a long winter) was sputtering out sparkling smoke.

"You're going to have a horrible time cleaning this up," she said mildly.

"I know," Daphne said morosely. "And I'd try just using magic, but that caused this whole mess in the first place, so..."

Sabrina nodded. "Want me to get some rags?" she offered.

Daphne gestured to a pile of brightly colored cloth in the corner of the room. "None of my old dresses fit anymore. I was just going to use them."

Sabrina gave her sister an incredulous look. How could none of her dresses-

Oh.

In the way these things happened, Sabrina hadn't paid too close attention to her sister's looks. She saw her every day, and Daphne was Daphne. And while Sabrina hadn't been paying attention, Daphne had blossomed into a woman in more ways than one. The dress she was currently wearing was meant to be loose, but it clung tightly to her sister's form, which bulged in places Sabrina didn't expect of a sister so much her junior.

"When did this happen?" Sabrina asked.

Daphne shrugged. "Puberty. I didn't notice, really."

"Until things started to not fit anymore," Sabrina said. She'd never had that problem, as her own figure was blessedly narrow (it made both sneaking and running much easier when she didn't have to worry about not fitting in tight spaces, or parts of her anatomy bouncing), but she could imagine it. When she'd had a growth spurt, it had been much the same way.

"Half that," Daphne shrugged. "Mostly I started to notice when the boys did."

"Do I need to kill anyone?" Sabrina asked, keeping her voice mild.

"No," Daphne said with a smile. "They're mostly pretty nice about it, and I can take care of the ones who aren't."

"As long as you're sure," Sabrina said.

Daphne grinned. "When am I not sure?"

"Good point," Sabrina agreed.

Daphne looked around at the mess of her main room and sighed. "I guess I should probably clean this up."

Sabrina nodded, and headed over to the corner, where all of Daphne's ill-fitting dresses were. The two worked on the room for a while, until it was reasonably clean. Some of Daphne's furniture would never quite recover, though.

Daphne shrugged when Sabrina pointed that out and said, "I'll put it in my bedroom. Nobody goes in there."

Sabrina didn't point out that they were heading into Daphne's bedroom right at that moment.

"So what did Puck do this time?" Daphne asked.

"Our room is a forest," Sabrina said dryly. "He said he likes sleeping outside. Well, he can just sleep alone, then."

Daphne laughed.

"You're sure you don't mind me staying here tonight?" Sabrina asked.

"No, of course not," Daphne said with a smile. "It's not as if we haven't shared a bed before."

This was true enough. Back when their parents had been missing, it had been a comfort thing for the two girls. Having a whole suite of rooms to oneself did not seem quite so appealing with over half of one's family missing. It felt big, lonely, and frightening, especially when one was ten.

Sabrina realized, then, that she'd come without some crucial things. "I forgot a nightdress," she admitted to her sister.

"And all mine that might fit you are inky," Daphne said.

"I guess I can sleep in this," Sabrina said, looking doubtfully at her dress, which was equipped with a rather heavy steel corset designed to act like armor.

"Or..." Daphne said, heading for her wardrobe. She turned around a minute later, brandishing a very large nightgown of her own. "You can wear this!"

Sabrina blinked at her sister, then shrugged.

Fifteen minutes later, Sabrina was swimming in an enormous nightgown, seated in her sister's bed, each of them with a cup of tea. Daphne had left a pot heating up while she made her letter.

"Want me to brush your hair?" Daphne asked.

"Sure," Sabrina agreed.

It had been even longer since they'd done this than it had been since they'd really spent much time together. Sabrina was pretty sure the last time, it had been before her wedding, actually. And not even right before. Daphne's hair styling techniques were... creative, to say the least, and Veronica had vetoed the idea of Daphne doing Sabrina's hair for the wedding. It was probably a good idea on Veronica's part, though it would have calmed Sabrina's pre-wedding nerves down to have Daphne brush her hair. Even if the results would have been unusual, and perhaps not the most flattering.

"I've missed this," Daphne said with a small, contented sigh, running the brush through her sister's hair.

"Me too," Sabrina agreed.

"We should spend more time together," Daphne suggested, putting the brush down after a long time of silence.

Sabrina turned to smile at her sister and said, "We should."

They talked long into the night, largely complaining about the shenanigans their brother had been getting up to, interrupting both their lives. Their brother, at nine, had largely recovered from his traumatic childhood, and was now quite a troublemaker. He and Puck were very close. Sabrina didn't think that was a good thing.

It was probably closer to morning than night by the time they finally fell asleep, tangled up together in Daphne's blankets, and Sabrina probably would have gotten more rest in her husband's temporary (and it had better well _be_ temporary) jungle, but she enjoyed herself far more. She'd missed her sister.

The next morning, though, when she was woken by a furious pounding on her sister's door, she began to regret her decision the smallest bit.

"Daphne," she said, shoving her sister. "Daphne, wake up."

Daphne groaned and rolled over, but she was on her way to being awake, so Sabrina got up, wrapping one of the blankets around herself for good measure as she went to see who was at the door. Maybe they'd go away if she answered it, and she could go back to sleep.

"What?" she asked the servant at the door, a girl about her age, probably working her way through school. She hoped she didn't sound as angry as she thought she did.

The girl won Sabrina's respect by sounding completely professional when she said, "You and your sister are wanted in the council room, your highness."

Sabrina groaned, but said, "Thank you," to the servant. The girl headed off to do whatever she had to do next, and Sabrina shut the door behind her before checking to make sure Daphne was actually awake.

She wasn't.

"Come on, brat, we've got work to do," Sabrina said, pulling the rest of Daphne's blankets off of her and proceeding to open all the curtains.

Daphne muttered a suggestion about where Sabrina could stick her work, but she rolled out of bed and onto the floor, where she sat in a dazed looking heap.

Sabrina redressed in yesterday's clothes while Daphne pulled herself out of the depths of sleep, washing up as best she could and braiding her hair. By the time she was ready, she was also certain that Daphne wouldn't go back to sleep if left alone. Satisfied, she headed to the council room, hoping she could stop by the kitchen for something to eat on the way.

She made her way to the council room, snacking on a relatively tasty pastry whose filling she didn't think she wanted to know.

Once there, she smiled at her family and sat down next to Puck, giving him a very crumby kiss on the cheek.

Puck wiped the crumbs off and licked them off his fingers. "Missed you last night," he said.

"Yeah, well, try not turning my bed into a rock and you won't have to miss me," Sabrina said pointedly.

"It was a bush, actually," Puck said. "And it was very comfortable."

"I like sleeping in beds," Sabrina responded with a shrug.

Daphne wandered into the room at long last, wiping crumbs off her mouth. She was dressed in clean clothes and her hair was done, though, so she was a little more put-together than Sabrina, even if she was late.

"Sorry," Daphne said, sitting. "We can get started now."

"If you can't be put together for these kinds of things, Daphne, you don't have to come," Henry said pointedly. "You're not of age yet, after all."

Considering Sabrina had been years younger than Daphne when she was crowned queen, she thought that was a bit unfair of her father, but it did have the desired effect. Daphne sat up straighter, putting a serious expression on her generally cheerful face.

"What's going on?" Daphne asked.

"You remember that girl in the monster room in Magica?" Veronica asked. "She's been located."

Sabrina didn't see how this was a problem until Henry said, "In the mainland. With all her monsters. Wreaking havoc. And they're blaming us."

Oh. Oh dear.

"But how can they blame _us_?" Puck burst out, because Sabrina's husband was a wonderful person, but not exactly up to date on world politics. "We didn't set her loose on them!"

"Nobody in the outside world keeps up with Tradeskingdom politics," Sabrina pointed out. "We might as well be one country to them."

"That's stupid," Puck said.

"Nevertheless, we need to do something about it, or there's going to be another war," Granny said.

"Like what?" Daphne asked.

"That's what we're here to decide," Veronica said.

"Someone's going to have to go get her," Sabrina said. It was the obvious decision, after all.

"Who, though?" Robin asked. "Most of us are still busy rebuilding the kingdom."

"Me," Sabrina said with a shrug.

The room exploded with arguments against this from every corner. Sabrina let them wash over her without saying anything. She didn't even really pay attention to what most of them were. Most of them seemed to come from the idea that this was entirely too dangerous for the heir to the throne of Sneak.

Once the noise had died down, Sabrina rolled her eyes and said, "I wouldn't go _alone_. I'd take a delegation with me, obviously. But we'd need someone fairly high ranking to go to get anyone to listen to us. They don't take us seriously as is, imagine what they'd do if we sent someone normal?"

"She has a point," Granny said, looking at Henry in a way that implied she knew how little he'd like the idea. "We'll need someone who can talk to important people, and quite a few countries out there don't consider our royals to actually be royalty. They'll consider our nobility to be worth listening to, but only barely. And now that Sabrina has chosen to give up her queenship in favor of you and Veronica, she's one of the few qualified people who has few enough responsibilities to take a trip of that duration."

"I've just gotten my daughter back," Henry said. "You expect me to let her go again?"

"You were asleep the whole time," Puck muttered.

"That's besides the point," Henry snapped.

Sabrina sighed and tuned the argument out. With Granny on her side, it was only a matter of time before she won her case.

* * *

She was right. A few weeks later, she was putting the final tweaks in her packing list for a sea trip to the mainland. Puck, of course, was going with her. They would be going under the guise of a diplomatic mission, but she and Puck fully expected to be fighting Red and her monsters themselves, and were packing to prepare for it. Sabrina had a lovely new pair of shoes that both had the advantage of making her look taller and contained a stiletto knife in each six-inch heel, and she'd packed some of her favorite dresses, as well as an abnormally large collection of poison-tipped knives that she would be wearing in various places on her body at all times (extra poison stored separately, but definitely packed). She'd be ready to go by morning.

She was putting the last of her stuff on the boat when Daphne waltzed by, directing Jonas, "Just put it wherever it'll fit, I guess."

"Put what where?" Sabrina asked Jonas.

"Daphne's things," Jonas said from around a very large pile of crates.

"Daphne's- what?" Sabrina turned to her sister. "You're coming?"

Daphne gave her a cheeky grin and said, "No offense, sister dearest, but you're absolutely horrible at diplomacy. Granny thought you could use some help."

Sabrina blinked at her sister.

"C'mon," Daphne said, linking elbows with her sister. "It'll be fun. You and me, getting into trouble. Just like old times. But with Puck."

"Yeah," Sabrina said vaguely. "Just like old times."

This trip was going to be a lot more eventful than she'd thought.


	2. Away to Foreign Lands

**AN~ Here! I updated on time, within a month, just like I said I would. There won't be an update of Daphne's Dates this week, for those of you who follow it. Next week, though. And THIS will update on the last Thursday of next month, if all goes well. Maybe the second-to-last Thursday.**

* * *

Sabrina stood at the bow of the _New Beginning_, breathing in the salty sea air and smiling. So far, she'd thoroughly enjoyed her first voyage across the open sea. In fact, she'd rather stay here as long as possible than continue to the approaching continent. Alas, they would reach the end of their sea voyage in a few days, if the captain was to be believed.

Sabrina believed the captain, and for her sister's sake, she was glad. Daphne, unlike Sabrina, had not taken well to sea travel, and had spent most of the trip with her head out the window, releasing what little food she'd managed to swallow into the ocean, or lying on her bunk and groaning.

"You'd make a good figurehead," a voice said.

Sabrina turned to see who was speaking. It was a sailor whose name she didn't know, a man in his early thirties, perhaps, with a face weathered by the ocean he lived on. Sabrina recognized the look of someone who spent most of his life at sea, living in a port city most of her life.

"I don't stay nearly still enough," she said with a laugh.

"Aye, but a figurehead's the life of a ship," the man said. "Some say they're real, not carved, and stuck to the boats with magic. And you, with your pretty hair blowing loose, and the way you're at home on this boat though it's your first time in the open sea, you'd make an excellent figurehead. Deadly and beautiful is what you are, princess. Like the sea itself."

Sabrina blushed. "Well, thank you. I think I might be missed, but I appreciate the sentiment."

The man smiled at her and returned to coiling his ropes neatly on the deck.

That was odd.

Puck clambered over the side of the deck (Sabrina spared a second to wonder what her husband had been doing on the hull of the boat, and how he'd managed to avoid getting dropped into the ocean) and said, "I don't think I like him."

Sabrina laughed. "Are you jealous or something?"

Puck rolled his eyes. "Of course not. He just seemed strange. And he's... been everywhere. That we've been, I mean."

"I'll keep an eye on him," Sabrina promised. Most of the crew of the ship was strangers to her, because they were on a Scholar ship, and Scholar tended to hire other people to do their long-range boating, as it took too much time away from their studies. Puck might have a point.

"Good," Puck said, and he gave her a smile that gave her butterflies in her stomach, even though they'd been married for some time now. "If you're watching out for him, he won't be able to do anything too dangerous."

Sabrina gave him a light shove. "Stop flattering me. Whatever you want, it won't get it for you."

"But you don't even like what they're serving for dinner tonight," Puck said with a grin, catching her hand and holding it.

"What is it?" Sabrina asked, not surprised that he wanted her food. This boy ate so much. "Eels again?"

"In sauce. On those biscuit things."

Sabrina rolled her eyes. "Fine. But I have to eat something, all right? You can have everything after I've eaten enough to get Daphne off my back."

Puck grinned and kissed her cheek. She turned so it was a real kiss and decided she could live with a boy who complimented her in exchange for her leftovers. There were perks to being married, after all.

* * *

Now that Puck had pointed it out, the sailor _was_ everywhere. At the next table over during meals, on the deck when she was enjoying the fresh air, disappearing around the corner when she went to check on Daphne. It was disconcerting.

Sabrina tried not to worry about it, while at the same time keeping a careful eye for any behavior more suspicious than _being_ half the places she happened to be. It was only a medium-sized ship, after all, and she kept running into a lot of the same people. She couldn't help it. So it could just be a coincidence.

Except, of course, that it didn't _feel_ like it was just a coincidence. And Puck had noticed. Puck only noticed things that were important (though what he thought was important sometimes confused Sabrina very much).

Daphne was too busy throwing up to be of much use, and Puck wasn't exactly a down-to-earth presence, so she was left to worry about this man for herself. So much for her fun sea voyage.

Well, her fun respite before the real work began. It seemed the work would start now.

Absolutely wonderful.

* * *

For a while, things were fine.

In fact, Sabrina was starting to get impatient with how calm things were. They were almost at their destination. Someone had spotted land the previous morning, actually, and they were on their way south along the coast to the port where they were supposed to put in. If this sailor was going to do anything, he'd have to do it soon. She certainly wasn't going to let him come with her to fight monsters.

"Are you excited?" Puck asked one night, as she stood on the deck and watched the shoreline pass.

Sabrina raised her eyebrows at him and said, "Why should I be?"

"First time visiting the continent," Puck said. "Or- is it your first time?"

"It is," Sabrina confirmed. "I just... it's not as if we'll exactly be given the grand tour, you know? I'd be far more excited if we knew what kind of welcome we'd be getting. I'm simply... tense."

Puck shook his head and gave her a fond smile. "You're never not tense."

Sabrina shrugged, not denying it, and looked up. "We should probably get inside. A storm's brewing."

Puck looked up at the sky skeptically- it had been gray all day, and it didn't look any darker now. But when a raindrop smacked into his eye, making him blink and wrinkle his nose, he conceded. Sabrina laughed and led him below decks while he wiped his face dry and sputtered.

They had an enjoyable hour or so below decks, making use of the rocking of the boat, the creaking of timbers, and the whistling wind outside to keep from being overheard as they whispered out of character things in each other's ears and made their affections known. Then there was dinner, and they went to bed.

Sabrina woke with water soaking the bed she shared with Puck, and sloshing all about the inside of her cabin.

She was wide awake in an instant, shaking Puck and clambering to her feet because "_The ship's sinking, idiot, I'm not drowning with you if you don't wake up_!"

Puck woke up a lot more slowly than Sabrina, but by the time she'd grabbed anything within sight that she didn't want to lose to the ocean and was ready to go make sure Daphne was safe, he was awake and following her out of the cabin.

"I'm going for Daphne," she said. "Go... find a raft, or something!"

Praise anyone that was paying attention, he listened. Sabrina sent up another prayer to angels or deities or whatever that she could get her sister out of here safely and headed for Daphne's cabin, shouting the whole time to wake anyone up that she could.

Daphne wasn't in her cabin.

Sabrina panicked for about six seconds before she realized that Daphne hadn't been sleeping well this whole trip, being too sick to her stomach to really rest. She'd probably (hopefully) woken up sometime during the night and either noticed the water and gotten the heck out of there, or she was hurling her guts over the side of the boat and didn't even realize there was a problem.

Please please please let Daphne be safe.

Sabrina would give anything to _know_ that her sister hadn't done anything as foolish as she'd done, burying herself deeper in a sinking ship out of some sense of protectiveness.

Speaking of which-

Sabrina ran through the rocking ship, shoving herself off walls and slogging through the waves, which were nearly at her knees now, and getting taller. Now that she knew Daphne wasn't in her room, she felt royally foolish for heading further from safety instead of towards the open air. Of course Daphne was out safe. As long as she hadn't gotten turned around and headed for the bottom of the boat by accident or something.

No. Daphne was safe. She had to be.

And oh thank goodness there were the stairs and where _was_ everybody the ship was frighteningly empty as if they'd been abandoned on it what was going _on_?

Sabrina pushed her way through the last few steps to the stairs and was up them faster than she'd have thought possible with the motion of the ship throwing her in all directions.

Puck was at the top of the stairs, on his way back down. "What took you so long?" he shouted over the wind.

"Sorry," Sabrina panted, holding up an arm against the rain lashing her face. "Hard to run through water. Daphne?"

Puck nodded towards the aft of the boat. "With the raft."

He wrapped an arm around her and together they pushed through the wind and the pouring rain towards the rear of the boat, working hard not to slide off the starboard side, which was tilting further and further towards sea level. The deck was completely empty.

Puck's 'raft' wasn't much to speak of, and looked almost as likely to sink as the ship itself. But almost wasn't definite, and the boat was going down, there was no doubt about that. So Sabrina spared half a second to give her sister a relieved once-over (Daphne was alive. Soaked and miserable looking, but not drowned) before she helped push the raft down the starboard side and into the water, where they were almost immediately carried away from the sinking ship by the force of the wind and the waves.

* * *

When the storm abated and the sun rose, they were within sight of land, but not with the wreckage of the ship.

Daphne lay on the floor of their raft, groaning, while Puck and Sabrina proceeded to steer their small craft towards the shore as best they could. It was slow going, and it would likely be a long day.

A very long day.

The sun rose higher in the sky and the trio found their skin covered in salty flakes left from the evaporation of the water they'd been soaked in the night before. The heat was ridiculous, considering how far north they were. This close to the surface of the ocean, the waves were rough enough that Sabrina and Puck were starting to feel a little queasy, too. There was no food or water.

Harder than all of this, though, was avoiding the rocks that stuck out of the ocean all over the place. Like most of the Tradeskingdoms, the shoreline here was mostly cliffs above a small beach, and beyond the cliffs there were rocky pillars, weathered by time, something like a dark gray inverse of the Tracks. In places they were far apart and the ocean was clear, but quite often they were close enough together to be difficult to navigate between in something as unwieldy as their raft. Most of the pillars were about fifteen to thirty feet tall, though some were shorter.

If Sabrina had to hazard a guess, she'd say that their ship had crashed into one of the shorter ones in the dark. After all, the reason they hadn't put to shore sooner was because the rocks made it too difficult to have a port at this part of the sea.

Sneak was the major port hub of the Tradeskingdoms because of the similar geology. Something had happened there, and the waters around Sneak were clear of most shipping hazards, as well as Sneak being well below the altitude of most of the rest of the Tradeskingdoms, even Scholar's islands. People speculated that Sneak hadn't existed when the rest of the Tradeskingdom continent had formed, and centuries of waves crashing against the hollow space had created a sort of fertile valley.

Not that that was particularly helpful now, of course. But Sabrina needed something to distract her from the monotony of what they were doing, and going over her geology lessons was better than nothing.

They almost crashed into a particularly spiky looking pillar, and Sabrina returned her mind to the task at hand, regretting ever considering it monotonous.

* * *

Finally, at almost sundown, they washed up on a small beach below the cliffs. Daphne hugged the ground, nearly sobbing, and Puck did something even more dramatic, kissing the sand. Sabrina was tempted to do the same, or at least watch fondly as her two favorite family members celebrated. She'd grown up at the seashore, though, and she knew the look of a beach that would be covered when the tide came in. They didn't have time to waste lying around down here, much as they might want to collapse here and not move. They needed to find a way to high ground, and they needed to get there before the tide crept up over them.

The cliffs looked climbable, on inspection. They were rougher than she'd expect for something that got pounded by the sea, with enough outcroppings that they'd be able to get a safe distance up them, if not all the way to the top.

She gave Puck and Daphne a few more minutes to recover while she scoped out the best route. To be honest, she could use some recovery time, too. She was _tired_.

Eventually, though, they had to get moving. It would be dark soon, and she had no desire to scale cliffs in the dark. She dragged her sister and her husband to the cliffs and said, "Up."

Puck groaned and muttered something about his wings.

"If they weren't soaked, I'd agree," she said, not needing to know exactly what he'd said. "But Daphne and I haven't got wings, and you can't carry us both right now." To be honest, he probably couldn't carry them both when he was in peak condition, not after what the Jabberwock had done to his wings. It was a miracle he could still fly at all.

They started up the cliffs.

It was a long, slow climb. Easy enough, as vertical hikes go, but they were all tired, and the sun set long before they reached the top. Thankfully, it was a clear night, but there were still a few close calls. By the time they reached the top, Sabrina was about as ready to kiss the ground as Daphne had been at the bottom. The only reason she didn't was because she blamed the ground for their plight as well as their relative safety.

"We should find somewhere to sleep," Daphne said eventually.

Sabrina moaned a complaint. Her sister was right, of course. It would be a very bad idea to sleep this close to the edge of a deadly drop. But her arms protested at the idea of moving, and her legs weren't all that much better.

"Come on," Daphne said, and shook her weakly.

Sabrina gave a single lazy roll away from the cliff's edge, flopping back down as soon as she was halfway turned over.

Daphne snorted. "Nice try."

"I'm too tired to roll off a cliff in my sleep," Sabrina said.

There was a scuffling noise. Sabrina turned very slowly to look at it, and saw that her sister was standing. She sighed, and levered herself slowly and painfully to her own feet. Puck followed, though he complained vehemently about having to do so.

The cliff was empty, nothing but scrubbly grass and rocks, for about thirty yards back from the place it dropped off to the ocean. Beyond that, it turned into an equally short and twisty forest. Judging by the wind that was blowing her hair out in front of her, there was a reason the trees didn't grow very tall or full. Spending the night behind the relative shelter of the trees would probably be quite a bit warmer, and not much more lumpy. Pine needles made for a good bed in a pinch.

Sabrina collapsed again once they were into the forest. Daphne and Puck went down with her, and she was out within minutes.

* * *

The three royals had, to their name, the following items: the two knives Sabrina wore strapped to herself at all times, even to bed; the one Daphne wore; a bottle of some kind of herbs that were supposed to prevent nausea but hadn't been doing Daphne much good; one very salty rope salvaged from their lost raft; Daphne's robe and all their nightclothes; one tin of cakes Puck had grabbed, now half-full after their breakfast; Sabrina's shoes; a somewhat soaked fire-starting kit; and a bag of coins.

They did _not_ have: a tent; shoes that would fit either Puck or Daphne; a map or any idea where they were, changes of clothes that were not filthy and caked in salt; soap; enough food to last them more than a few days, with the way Puck and Daphne ate; a compass; directions; or a way of contacting anyone who could be of help.

They also had nothing that would make anyone they met believe their story, beyond being shipwrecked. The shipwreck was believable.

The first order of business was to find a town of some kind. Once there, they would hopefully be able to send a letter to Sneak and to the royal palace of whatever kingdom they were in, as well as their final destination. If they had enough money left after getting food and clothes and sending their mail, they'd stay at an inn. If they didn't, Sabrina and Daphne (and probably Puck, come to think of it) had enough survival skills to make it on their own.

By the time they agreed on this plan of action, it was nearly noon. And by the time they'd agreed on a direction to travel in (Sabrina had seen a town to the north shortly before their crash; Puck thought that since they were supposed to be heading south, it didn't make sense to head in the opposite direction; and Daphne wanted to go east and get as far away from the sea as possible), it was probably close to three in the afternoon.

Sabrina won. After all, none of them wanted to wander for any longer than they absolutely had to, and a definite town a day's sailing north was better than a possible town in any of the directions they actually _wanted_ to travel.

They walked through the clear space west of the forest. It was easier going, and they could see what was in front of them. By the time nightfall came again, though, they were still the only sign of humanity within sight. Back to the forest they went, to set up a camp a little better than the one of the night before. This time they were awake enough to look for a spot that was clear of roots, and to move the rocks out from under the place they were sleeping. None of the trio had any desire to wake up with more bruises.

Sabrina's fire-starting kit had dried out a little, so she instructed Puck to see if he could get them a fire going without burning down the whole forest. She and Daphne went out to look for wood or anything edible.

"Bit odd, isn't it?" Daphne asked. "That we haven't seen anyone else? Where did the rest of the crew go? Did they wash up south of us, or are they all dead, or did they abandon us, or what?"

Sabrina gave her sister a shrug that simultaneously acknowledged her sister's suspicions and conveyed that she had no idea what was going on. "Did you see anything odd while you were on the deck?" She stooped to pick up a few dry sticks of a decent size.

"I was a bit busy emptying my stomach," Daphne said dryly. "Didn't see anyone. Look!" She pointed to a bush a distance away. "Blackberries!"

While Sabrina and Daphne were picking as many ripe berries as they could get their hands on, storing them in Daphne's skirt, Sabrina shared her suspicions about the one sailor in particular with Daphne. "I didn't see anything that I could call him out on, but he was definitely unusual." She picked her branches back up and headed back to their campsite with Daphne following after.

Puck had a small fire started when they reached camp, and Sabrina piled her branches next to it while Daphne divided up the berries. They stayed up late discussing possibilities, then went to sleep. It wasn't a very sound sleep.


	3. New Friends and Old Enemies

**AN~ I'M SO SORRY GUYS. I meant to update ages ago I really did but then I ended up having two jobs and being swamped and not having free time for anything I wanted to do or energy for writing but I'm back now. Promise. (Also a note: I gave Pinocchio the last name Carlodi because it's the author of the story's last name and I didn't really feel like researching for a better one.)**

**Star: **Sorry it took me so long, but thank you for the compliment!

**riverripple: **Thank you very much! I'm sorry I dropped off the grid for a couple months, but I'm back now hopefully to update regularly!

**Guest 1: **I don't think I specified that in this AU, Puck COULD shapeshift. If I did, well then whoops that was an oversight on my part, but he'd have to, like, shapeshift into a WHALE or something to be able to help Sabrina and Daphne, too, and that would be kinda dangerous for someone who's not actually used to swimming in the ocean when there are a lot of obstacles. He might get them all hurt really bad. Kinda dangerous.

**Guest 2: **Care to tell me why so I can improve?

* * *

It was another day and a half before they finally reached civilization. If it hadn't been high summer, they probably would have been half starved by the time they made it. Puck claimed he was half-starved as it was. Sabrina ignored him, because even though berries weren't exactly filling, he had entirely too much energy to _really_ be starving.

When they got to the town, it wasn't really much. A village, maybe, and Sabrina hesitated to call it that. A small cluster of houses kind of wrapping around a central clear space. Her hopes of sleeping in a real bed disappeared. This place didn't look like it had an inn.

"Told you we should have gone south," Puck muttered. "I'm surprised you even noticed this place."

Sabrina shrugged. "We can always turn around."

"_No_!" Daphne and Puck exploded at the same time.

Sabrina snickered and headed into the town, trying not to be too worried by the fact that she was wearing a ragged nightdress and hadn't had a bath in far too long, and that Puck and Daphne were in worse condition.

She asked the first person she saw for directions to someplace they could buy clothes and supplies, and was directed to the far side of the clearing in the center of the town, a lopsided thing that the residents called "the square" but was far closer to the shape of a fried egg than any square Sabrina had ever seen.

"Hello?" Sabrina called on arrival. They'd reached one of the only two-story buildings in the village, a weather-worn structure made partially of stone and partially of warped wood that might have been salvaged from wrecks and might just have come off the equally twisted trees of the nearby forest.

For a few seconds there was no response. Then there was a snort, a crash, and a groan.

A small, scattered-looking man appeared in the doorway. He was old, what little of his hair remained going bald. A large nose and equally large set of front teeth were overshadowed by his spectacles, and under one arm he carried a broken puppet.

"Sorry," the man said. "I was distracted."

Sabrina gave a polite cough.

The man ignored her, gave the trio a bright smile, and said, "Welcome to Geppetto's General Store. I'm Geppetto, proprietor. What can I provide you with, travelers?"

He made no comment on the fact that they were clad in pajamas, filthy, and, for the most part, barefoot. Sabrina wondered if he was being tactful or if he simply hadn't noticed.

Before she could tell him what they needed, though, Daphne let out a loud shriek.

"Geppetto?" Daphne demanded excitedly. "Geppetto Carlodi? Formerly of Magica?"

"Yes," Geppetto said, looking more befuddled than before. "Do I know you?"

"No no no certainly not we've never met," Daphne said in a rush, practically bouncing up and down and fighting to keep her palm out of her mouth. "I know your son, though. We're friends. He's been looking for you. Or, well, perhaps not looking, but he's been hoping to find you and asking others to look for you. He isn't the type to do much searching himself, you know. Not much for activity or travel."

"I- what?" the old man asked. He wasn't the first to be overwhelmed by Daphne's occasional tendency to babble where it came to Pinocchio, though she never did it in Sabrina's direction. Sabrina had tried to get Daphne to harness this ability in her favor, but it didn't seem to have caught on yet.

"Sorry," Sabrina said, cutting in and steering the conversation back into useful directions. "You'll get a more sensible explanation later, I promise. At the moment, do you think you could sell us some clothes?"

* * *

A little under two hours later, the three were outfitted much better, though they were significantly shorter on funds. Daphne had explained about Pinocchio in a way that made sense, and Geppetto, in light of their mutual acquaintance, was feeding them dinner and offering them lodging for the night without charge. Sabrina was grateful, because they now had two coppers left. Total.

"So tell us," Daphne said over a platter of meat pies. "Where have you _been_?"

Sabrina perked up, interested in the information. She'd heard about Pinocchio's missing father in Daphne's attempt to explain why she and the traitor were now friends, and information was always useful. Puck, sitting catty-corner to Sabrina, was too busy inhaling non-berry food to be paying much attention. Sabrina, though, Sabrina could multi-task. Besides, if it could distract Daphne from food, it had to be interesting.

Geppetto sighed and said, "That is a long story, and not one that paints me very well. I should never have abandoned my son."

Sabrina, who had strong feelings about such matters, privately agreed. But she let Geppetto tell his story.

It seemed the toymaker- for that's what he was, truly, not a shopkeeper- had heard the stirrings of war, and like most people who could, decided to get out of Magica before things came to a head. The problem was that his wife didn't want to leave. So he dithered, arguing with her, trying to convince her to leave, or at least let him take their son. His wife, who was a fairly powerful figure in Magica, insisted she could keep Pinocchio safe. She put a spell on him so nobody could harm him, and that was that, as far as she was concerned.

Then she became a casualty of the war. Geppetto wanted to get his son out, but his wife's magic held sway, and therein lay the problem: her spell considered taking Pinocchio away from his home to be harming him. It, combined with the spell around Magica designed to keep in all the citizens, wouldn't let Geppetto do it.

So he left. He didn't leave Pinocchio alone, of course. He left him with friends. It was still foolish, but he knew he needed to get out of there to be safe, and that he couldn't stay for a second longer in the place where his wife had died. He came to the continent and built a new life.

Sabrina didn't think this was a good enough reason to abandon family. Then again, she was a little prejudiced about abandonment, so when Daphne said, "He misses you. You should contact him," she didn't say what she wanted to (this was something along the lines of: "you don't deserve to ever see your son again! Shame on you!"). Instead, she simply kept her peace.

"I can't return to Magica," Geppetto said. "Even if the war is over, I won't be welcomed back. To have left... it makes me a traitor."

"Things are different now," Daphne answered. "They're changing things. And even if they weren't, Pinocchio isn't in Magica! He's in Scholar."

This remark, which explained absolutely nothing, led to another explanation about what had been going on in the Tradeskingdoms. Sabrina was a little surprised that Geppetto hadn't heard _anything_, but it tracked with what she knew of outsiders' opinions on Tradeskingdom politics: unimportant; trivial. She took note. It would be useful for gearing her actions towards anyone she met.

Daphne was now scribbling down Pinocchio's address while talking animatedly about what he'd been up to and encouraging Geppetto to write him as soon as possible in the same breath.

"I'm not certain," Geppetto said doubtfully. "I've been silent for so long, he may not want to talk to me."

"He misses you," Daphne assured him. "He wants to see you again."

"Very well," Geppetto acquiesced. "I'll write him."

Daphne beamed and returned to eating her meat pies, fighting with Puck over the last few.

* * *

The following morning, armed with entirely more things than they had money to pay for, Sabrina, Puck, and Daphne headed for the capital. They were supposed to be there well before now, but there was nothing to do about that now other than to try to reach their destination as fast as possible. She'd sent a letter to her family and another to the capital, but there was no telling how quickly mail would travel from such a tiny village.

"How can you read that thing?" Puck asked, squinting at the map Geppetto had given them. "It's the whole coastline!"

Sabrina had protested the number of things Geppetto had given them, but he'd insisted that it was the least he could do after they gave him information about his son. Besides, he'd pointed out, most of these things would never be bought by his regular clientele. It should be confessed that Sabrina didn't argue too hard. They needed these things.

"Geppetto marked where we are," Sabrina explained, pointing at the little X on the map. "We'l walk about three miles an hour, maybe less in rough terrain, and the scale at the bottom left shows us how long a mile on the map is. We're trying to get here," she pointed at their destination, a large circle on the map. "This time of year, the sun doesn't rise directly in the east, so I'm compensating for that where we can't see landmarks. But this is a good map; and it's got landmarks picked out fairly clearly."

"Yeah I understood none of that," Puck said.

Sabrina rolled her eyes, realizing a little late that she'd been talking as if her listener actually wanted to know how to read a map, and not as if he simply wanted to cause trouble. "Suffice to say that I can get us there," she promised.

"How long?" Daphne asked, peeking over Sabrina's shoulder as they walked. "We're already late."

"Three weeks?" Sabrina estimated. "If we make good time and don't get lost or injured. Hopefully no more than a month."

"Wouldn't it be faster to go through the woods?" Puck asked, drawing a straight line between them and the capital, which was little other than forest. "Why are we following the coast? We just came from here."

"We know the area a little," Sabrina said. "We can make better time. Plus it's a lot harder to get lost when there's a giant cliff right there the whole time that I can match up to the map."

Puck groaned. "If I've got to walk through wilderness, I'd really rather it be _new_ wilderness."

"Aww, is my poor princeling bored?" Sabrina cooed.

"Always," Puck muttered. "I should have stayed home and let you do this on your own."

"You'd have missed me too much," Sabrina said, wrapping an arm around him. "You love me."

"No I don't," Puck said, kissing the side of her head.

"Hurry up, you two, you're walking too slow!" Daphne called.

Sabrina and Puck, noticing for the first time that Daphne had outpaced them by a good twenty yards while they were talking, quickened their pace.

* * *

They made much better time traveling south than north. For one thing, they weren't trying to keep hidden this time around. It was less than a week before they made it to another village, this one somewhat larger than their first detour.

Still, Sabrina was gratified to note that her village was definitely closer than any of the other options, and her direction had been the right choice. She considered it beneath her dignity to point this out to the others, though.

"Stop looking so smug," Daphne said without any heat.

Well, perhaps she hadn't been as good at disguising her silent "I told you so" as she'd thought. She deserved to be smug, though, so she didn't school her expression. Much.

It appeared to be market day, because there was a lot more activity than Sabrina would regularly expect for a village of this size. Unlike Geppetto's home, this town was of a good size to have a market. It was more than a collection of people who happened to have built their homes close to each other. Sabrina was rather glad that they hadn't shown up in this village wearing nightshirts.

They wandered into the town, looking for somewhere they could trade for food, or perhaps do some small tasks to earn more money. Daphne looked in her element. Sabrina was unsurprised. Her sister loved people. Sabrina herself was a little more reserved, but it was nice to blend into a crowd for a change, and she allowed herself to relax and be swept up into the organized chaos of a small town's market day.

Until a voice behind her shrieked, "_You_!"

Sabrina turned to see Puck standing about fifteen feet away, someone pointing at him. She couldn't see their face.

"You're supposed to be dead!" the person pointing at Puck shouted.

"I... um..." Puck said, wide-eyed.

Other people were stopping their business to stare at the spectacle. Not everyone was stopping, though. A number of people- worrisomely familiar people- were moving forward to form a loose ring around Puck. Sabrina caught Daphne's eye across the crowd. Daphne nodded, and the two edged closer to Puck. Sabrina was digging a knife out of her pocket, concocting several getaway schemes as she moved. There wasn't much place to hide unless they broke into someone's home, but the woods wasn't that far away, and if they used the crowd to their advantage...

"How are you alive? We made certain you were on the ship when it went down!" the person demanded.

Sabrina had reached a place where she could see his face, and she froze, stifling a gasp. It was the creepy sailor from their ship.

She'd thought it was a little suspicious that everyone else had been gone when she awoke, but the confirmation that they'd been betrayed still stung.

"Oh, she's going to kill us," the man said. "She said to make absolutely certain you all died, and now we've mucked it up. I don't want to make her angry." His expression hardened. "You're going to have to die."

"I have no idea what you're talking about, my good fellow," Puck said, no longer looking dumbstruck and now looking a little worried and confused. He caught Sabrina's eye.

She nodded reassuringly: _I have it under control_. She didn't, not entirely, but she was certain enough that she could get them out of there that Puck didn't need to be disturbed. She could handle it.

"Did the girls survive?" the man demanded.

Sabrina got Daphne's attention and mouthed, _Run_. She jerked her head towards the woods. Daphne shook her head. Sabrina glared at her sister and; through a combination of signals Sneak students learned to use for communicating silently, mouthed words, and expressions; communicated that she needed to be able to focus on Puck and that they'd meet up in the forest.

Daphne made a face, but headed discreetly for the edge of town.

Puck had apparently said something he thought was clever, because he was grinning at the sailor. It probably had been clever, because the circle of people around him (which he didn't seem to have noticed) looked _angry_.

All right, no time for clever plans then. Sabrina would just have to get Puck out of there before he irritated anyone into beheading him on principle. Thank goodness she'd made it fairly close to him without being recognized herself.

"Look over there!" she shrieked, pointing away from Puck and playing up the 'terrified damsel' angle for all she was worth. "Is that a monster?"

It worked. Praise all powers that might possibly exist, it worked. Sabrina didn't know if it was because of Red and her monsters or if people were normally that gullible, but everyone looked. While they were distracted, she grabbed Puck and started a mad dash for the scraggly trees.

She was a long way into the trees before she let them slow down. Finally she broke their pace, acknowledging that it was likely to give one of them a twisted ankle- if not a broken skull. The village was out of sight, though she could hear vague sounds of pursuit through the trees. They were far enough away that she let their jog slow to a walk, no longer dragging an unwilling Puck behind her like so much extra baggage.

Puck let out a grumbled complaint which Sabrina ignored in favor of beginning to search for Daphne.

The problem, of course, was that the girls hadn't been able to set up a place to meet if they got separated. They hadn't thought there would be an occasion which would cause them to get separated, let alone a crisis which would require them to run, hide, and completely restrategize. Sloppy of them, and Sabrina cursed herself for not thinking more critically.

"If I were Daphne, where would I hide?" Sabrina mused.

"Up a tree?" Puck suggested.

That was a possibility. Daphne liked trees. It made a bigger problem, though. There were hundreds of options of trees for Daphne to hide in, all twisty, with low-growing branches. Perfect for climbing quickly, just as good for hiding.

Of course, Daphne would be looking for Sabrina. Waiting for her. So she wouldn't go too far, because she'd be planning to meet up.

Sabrina could have passed her. Daphne could have not run far enough. The crew of their sunken ship could catch her. They could-

Before Sabrina could carry this train of thought too far, there was a whispered "_Hsst_!" from a tree about thirty yards to the south. Sabrina looked up and saw her sister. She let out a breath. Thank the lord.

She and Puck headed for Daphne's location, trying to be as silent as possible to keep from making it any easier for their pursuers to find them.

Daphne climbed down from the tree, and Sabrina led them deeper into the forest, towards safety.

* * *

"Now what?" Daphne asked eventually. They were far enough away that it was probably safe to talk, though Sabrina would have rather played it safe. And Daphne _was_ speaking softly.

"Well, I don't think it's safe to travel along the coast," Sabrina said, reevaluating the plan more actively than she'd been doing up until this point.

Puck snorted. "Goodness. What gave you that idea?"

Sabrina ignored him and said, "Negatively, they know we're in the woods. Positively, they haven't found us yet and we can probably stay hidden in here. Besides, it is a straighter path, and we'll be able to find food if we have to."

"Do we know where we are right now?" Daphne asked, looking doubtfully at the trees around them. "I didn't see many landmarks on this part of the map."

"I can figure it out," Sabrina said, more confidently than she felt.

"Okay," Daphne said. She sounded about as confident in Sabrina's ability to get them through this as Sabrina herself currently felt, but as if she rather wanted to believe it would be that simple.

"This entire trip was a bad idea," Puck grumbled suddenly. "What's the mainland ever done for us? We should have just left them to deal with the monsters on their own, like they did us during the war. We've been shipwrecked and marooned and chased across the wilderness and we have nothing to show for it except that Daphne made a new friend."

"That's not very nice," Daphne said. "They asked us for help. This is a good way to show our good faith and to get them to take us seriously. Now they'll owe us, if we do a good job. Plus it's not the commoner's fault. We shouldn't let them suffer because their rulers think we're jokes."

Sabrina didn't say anything. To be honest, she agreed with Puck. Maybe it was simply her irritability talking, but she couldn't help but wish that she'd never left her home land mass.

Puck and Daphne continued to bicker for a time before Daphne suddenly decided that she wasn't speaking to Puck. She moved to stand on Sabrina's other side. Puck followed her, and a mad sort of game of tag ensued, with Sabrina at the center, Daphne trying to get away from Puck without losing her angry dignity and Puck following just to irritate her. They both almost tripped Sabrina (or tripped over her) several times.

Sabrina sighed. It was going to be a long day.


End file.
